Toys I'm looking forward to in 2011

It's the new year. What toys am I looking foward to this year? Let me be clear, I'm a Lego and MotUC collector, so those will feature highly on my list. But I do dabble in other lines and cherry pick stuff that I thought would be nice. So, without further ado, here's my list of specific figures that I think have a good chance of being made this year. Note that I'm only limiting it to one figure per line.

Mattel has already announced the first four figures of the year - Vikor, Bow, King Hiss and Sy-Klone, and we know we are getting the Palace Guards, a Weapons Rack and a vehicle in 2011.  The figure I'm looking forward to and I hope it'll be this year, besides Extendar, of course (but that's just a pipedream since he's a complete new sculpt), is Stinkor.  Most of the parts for Stinkor is already there, all that remains isn't the head (which is Merman's repainted head) but the armour, which will also handily come in for Mekaneck.  The other thing that could throw a spanner in the works for Stinkor is his smell, but come on Mattel, Patchouli is patchouli and should be procurable in large quantities almost everywhere... as long as it's not the edible version...

Lego sneakily previewed a Jack Sparrow minifigure at SDCC last year, and has announced the Pirates of the Carribean as a new line for 2011.  This is such a great idea as there are so many wonderful sets and fantastic scenes from the movies that Lego could use.  Pirate ships are definitely a given, but think about the sea monsters, the skeleton armies, castles, aztecs... there could be so much to the theme if Lego made this.  This would be Castle meets Pirates meets Indianna Jones.  It would be epic.  Now, other than Star Wars, Lego hasn't been known to be exceptional with its licensed themes, so I hope that this wouldn't suffer from poor choice of sets and poor design.  The sets have not yet been revealed yet so I'm sure there are some, like me waiting with bated breath.

Revoltech Sci-Fi series has got a whole bunch of licenses that there's no telling what they will make from month to month... except when checking out their website, which is in Japanese.  March will see the release of Iron Man, and this has got to be better than anything Hasbro has put out in the past 2 years.  The highly articulated figure seems to be very well scupted, and unlike Jack Skellington, doesn't seem to suffer from a balance/centre of gravity issue.  I'm sure he'll be able to stand upright on its own, which would be good news.  This will come with a ton of accessories, and probably a great display stand of some sort, a given Japanese hallmark.  2011 is also supposed ot bring more Revoltech sci-fi characters from both sides of the pacific including characters from the Alien movies.

Soul of Chogokin has been one of my favourite relaunches in recent years, with some of the best reimaginings of the robots of the 60s and 70s with today's technology.  2010 was a rather boring year for the line for me as the robots were not those that I had any nostalgia for.  2011 though, would be different.  Daltanius would be the second figure of the year after a battleship of some sort, and God Sigma after that a couple of months later.  I can't decide which one I am looking forward more to, but I think Daltanius' design, with the lion in the chest, and the abilitity to transform into 4 separate components, probably puts it ahead of the rather boring by comparison gestalt God Sigma.  These toys aren't cheap - they can run into the 50s and 60s, but the upside is that they are mostly die cast metal (hence chogokin), and they do stand over a feet tall.

And while I'm on a run of Japanese robots, I might as well add Voltron to the list.  Although this robot originated in Japan, this toy will for the first time be made by an American toy maker.  Mattel picked up the license last year and the earliest we can expect any news is probably SDCC in the middle of the year.  Hopefully Mattel will be smart and make him available in October/November in time for Christmas.  I seriously have no idea how Mattel will handle this.  Will they make the human characters?  Will they make the five lions separately?  Who knows?  It's Mattel.  They would probably try to think outside the box and do weird things for the line.  I do hope we'd get the characters though in addition to the robots.  And hopefully, Mattel will give us good accessories for those characters.  Another good pack-in would be a cardboard diorama for the individual lions, but again, that's just my pipe dream.

Staying with Mattel, they did revealed the LSH DCUC at SDCC last year and I was stoked.  I'm a huge fan of the Legion of Superheroes, and I can't wait to get these in my hands.  Granted, the 12-pack seems a bit of an overkill from a price point of view - I mean I only do want a few figures here and there including Cos there (but he's in his original costume... not my favourite).  The upside is that there will be no hunting around for the CnC to build Gim (and I hope he's at a good height, and does have a normal version in addition to his "colossal" version).  Mattel has been good in releasing DCUCs on Mattycollector for those who have failed in their hunt for these figures, so I hope the LSH pack will be on there at some point.

Another new line that should hopefully have its debut this year, or rather it's re-debut this year are the Thundercats.  Bandai has the license for this property, but have yet to give us much infomation about the line.  I think the earliest that we'll get any infomation will be at NYTF, and it will probably launch in the second half of the year with Lion-O as the first figure.  I do hope that they will mix it up a bit and give us Bengali before Tigra for instance, and Jaga before Panthro, but other than that it'll be good to see these back in production.  Hopefully Bandai will do this good, with a good amount of articulation (please get help from Bandai Japan) and good solid materials (aka plastic that would last yet doesn't hamper the articulation) and a solid paint job.  And the figure I would want most from this line?  Tigra!

Another line that might see the light of day this year would be the Back to the Future toyline, and I seriously hope that the line will have more than the deLorean.  I'd like a Marty McFly figure please, and the whole cast of characters.  More so, I'd like dioramas, especially of the town centre and the Under the Sea dance.  The deLorean would be nice, and there are multiple versions of the vehicle, so I hope they wouldn't break the bank, but will be costed at an appropriate price point, yet be faithful to the movie original.  And I would like a purple CK wearing Marty McFly please... Mattel, are you listening?

I tried to think of two more characters in lines that I'm actually looking forward to this year to make this a list with 10 items.  But I really can't think of anything other than these eight, so I guess I'll go with these.  Have a Happy New Year, y'all!  Let's hope that this will be a good year toywise for all of us.